Is there still a "flower head" in domestic blockchain?, No Bitcoin, First Blockchain Technology National Standard Released Web3.0 | Blockchain | Domestic

The 6.18 shopping festival has just come to an end, and express delivery is about to reach its peak. In the logistics warehouse of Whale Warehouse, 42 cargo boxes of Spider Man shuttle through the 9-meter-high shelf gap. AI is their brain, and their task is to "pick up the boxes". Once they receive an order instruction, these spidermen will accurately locate the location of the box where the goods are stored in milliseconds and quickly transport it to the picking table, the entire process only takes two minutes.

Unlike in previous years, these spider humans have achieved "on chain" for the first time in the industry, with all operational data encrypted and circulated on the blockchain network, laying the foundation for the large-scale development and trustworthy collaboration of the warehousing and logistics industry.

After experiencing the sharp rise and fall of Bitcoin and the temporary glory of NFT, domestic blockchain seized the opportunity of digital transformation of the real economy, opened up its own technological "island", and broke through an industrialization path in finance, logistics, carbon reduction and other fields.

Breaking the "isolated island"

Recently, the national standard "Reference Architecture for Blockchain and Distributed Accounting Technology" was officially released and will be implemented on December 1st this year. This is also the first national standard approved for release in the field of blockchain technology in China.

"Blockchain is not a new phenomenon in China, but various parties have different definitions of blockchain, and basic concepts such as distributed accounting technology and artificial intelligence contracts are also slightly different, making it difficult to form industry consensus." Li Ming, Chairman of the Blockchain and Distributed Accounting Standardization Committee of the IEEE Computer Association, told reporters that in the process of formulating national standards, the team solicited opinions from all parties as widely as possible and held meetings in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong, Sichuan, Jiangxi, and other places. After more than a year of soliciting opinions, the standard text was formed, which is also the process of reaching consensus.

According to the national standard, blockchain is a new type of database software that integrates multiple technologies such as distributed networks, encryption technology, and smart contracts. Currently, this national standard has been applied in hundreds of typical blockchain enterprises.

In the early stages of the industry, due to technological advancement and lagging standards, different blockchain systems had different technological paths in communication protocols, identity management, and other aspects. With the increasingly complex business forms and diverse application scenarios of blockchain, more and more blockchain projects and on chain applications have emerged. However, due to the fact that chains are mostly independent of each other, countless "islands" have been formed. According to the Blockchain White Paper, as of September 2022, there are a total of 6914 blockchain related enterprises worldwide. Due to technological differences among various enterprises, information silos are formed between each chain, which objectively hinders interconnection and affects efficient collaboration among institutions.

Currently, the demand for cross chain interoperability is becoming increasingly urgent. The key of blockchain from "LAN" to "Internet" is that different blockchain systems need "language communication". After crossing chains, each chain transforms from an isolated island into an interconnected and open ecosystem. Cross chain technology can achieve information security and trustworthy interaction between different blockchain systems, achieve data exchange and value flow, and bridge the boundaries of "language", which is the technological foundation for the prosperity of the blockchain ecosystem.

"The introduction of national standards is only the first step. With national standards, enterprises can more effectively cross chain." Li Ming said that cross chain standards stipulate a unified communication protocol, just like allowing people who used to speak different dialects to start speaking Mandarin, which will greatly reduce the cost of interoperability.

"From now on, there are three major trends in the development of blockchain in China: platformization, componentization, and integration." Li Ming told reporters that currently, various regions have their own blockchain services, such as Chang'an Chain, Shuxin Chain, and Haihe Chain. These blockchains have formed platforms, and related enterprises do not need to build underlying systems. They can develop applications on existing platforms, reducing development costs. At the same time, key technologies of blockchain can be individually encapsulated, such as smart contracts, digital signatures, etc., which can form independent products. As the blockchain industry further subdivides, independently encapsulated components can improve system flexibility.

He also stated that, like new generation information technologies such as artificial intelligence, blockchain is also a data oriented technology, and integration with other technologies is an inevitable trend, such as privacy computing and the Internet of Things, which are deeply related to blockchain. Nowadays, the booming GPT requires a lot of computing power, and providing computing power support through distributed computing may be the solution. In addition, the data exchange demands between different blockchain systems such as energy chain, financial chain, and copyright chain not only require cross chain capabilities, but also require the coexistence of distributed and traditional centralized system integration in blockchain.

Rammed base

A few years ago, blockchain was almost equated with virtual currency, with Bitcoin, Ethereum, and others emerging one after another. "Mining" became an industry buzzword, and even inflated processor prices at one point. With the rise of the concept of the metaverse, NFT digital collectibles have once again sparked market frenzy, with a boring ape NFT even selling for millions of yuan in 2021

In the same year, China's NFT industry began to prosper. Ant Group launched the NFT platform Jingtan. Tencent, Baidu, Bilibili and other Internet giants almost caught up with this wave. According to media predictions, during the peak period, only Whale Exploration and Tencent's NFT platform Huanhe will attract nearly one million users per day. Xu Beihong's Digital Moma Collection will sell for 3.68 million yuan in just one minute.

Unfortunately, the trend in the NFT industry has not lasted for too long. On August 16th last year, Huanhe, who had just turned one year old, announced the official discontinuation of digital collectibles, and recently announced that it will be completely taken offline at 24:00 on June 30th this year. Tencent's explanation for this is very direct: "Currently, there are no clear laws, regulations, and policy documents related to digital collectibles in China. As an emerging field, digital collectibles face significant uncertainty and risk in both industry and regulatory risks."

In contrast, the technology base of virtual currency and NFT, blockchain, is quietly growing, iterating and expanding its application scenarios. The new national standard recognizes blockchain as an important component of the new generation of information technology and an important technological support for the development of the digital economy.

The Whale Warehouse "Spider Man" intelligent three-dimensional storage system mentioned earlier is one of the examples of blockchain empowering the industry. According to Li Linzi, the founder of Whale Warehouse, a 6000 square meter warehouse houses over 40 brands and over 2.5 million items, with a storage capacity six times that of traditional warehouses. The utilization rate of warehouse space has increased from 10% to 85%, and efficiency has also increased by three times. For better and more efficient collaboration, Whale Warehouse adopts blockchain and Internet of Things technology to encrypt the operation information, order and fund transaction information of the spider picking system on the chain, allowing multiple parties to jointly view a trustworthy ledger. Due to the authenticity, credibility, and abundance of these data, Whale Warehouse can lease warehouses and equipment from industrial capital at lower costs, achieving light asset operations.

In the capital market, the intervention of blockchain can also reduce credit risks and provide financing guarantees for innovative enterprises. Energy service provider Huidian Yunlian has participated in the construction of multiple energy storage power station projects both domestically and internationally. However, the global energy storage industry faces pain points such as safety risks, warranty cycle risks, performance uncertainties, and revenue uncertainties, which have led to significant risk exposure and financing difficulties between the needs of power station owners and the service systems of equipment suppliers. To this end, Huidian Yunlian and Ant Chain have collaborated to establish a full cycle data, algorithm, and digital technology service system based on materials, components, systems, scenarios, and residual values, making the data of energy storage projects trustworthy, visible and quantifiable in risk, and evaluable in value. This has enabled the asset evaluation, asset management, and asset operation of energy storage systems and projects throughout their entire life cycle to be "on the chain", ultimately attracting Yicun Capital to provide financial solutions and financial support.

Blockchain has long been practiced in preventing telecommunications fraud and other aspects of people's livelihoods. Ant Chain has assisted in creating the country's first blockchain based "anti fraud alliance chain", which solves the problem of risk information sharing through on chain data collaboration with public security, People's Bank of China, and operators. Within a year, it has processed over 2.4 million warning data, protected the victim's fund account 1380 times, intercepted 13.4 million defrauded funds, and securely shared millions of black and gray data. This practice has also been included in the "2022 Typical Application Cases of Blockchain" by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

Shanghai Opportunities

According to a report by well-known research firm IDC, it is expected that the global blockchain market will reach 18.95 billion US dollars in 2024, and the Chinese market size is expected to exceed 2.5 billion US dollars, with the market size expected to remain the second largest in the world. Faced with this 10 billion dollar market, Shanghai has already taken the lead in the process of formulating national standards and the implementation of industries such as NFT. The 2021 China Urban Blockchain Comprehensive Index Report shows that Shanghai ranks second in the national blockchain comprehensive index, with nearly 1400 blockchain enterprises with input-output in the country, and Shanghai accounts for about 1/4. Among the units involved in drafting the national standard for blockchain, there are also Shanghai figures such as Ant Blockchain, Chain Extreme Intelligent Technology, Fudan University, and Shanghai Computer Software Technology Development Center.

At present, speculation and speculation in virtual currencies such as Bitcoin are explicitly prohibited in China, but transactions in NFT digital collectibles are already in the exploratory stage. As early as July last year, Shanghai clearly supported the exploration of NFT trading platform construction, and researched and promoted the digitization of NFT and other assets, the global circulation of digital IP, and the protection of digital rights. This statement is relatively rare in government documents of other regions, even earlier than Hong Kong's Policy Declaration on the Development of Virtual Assets in Hong Kong.

At the level of blockchain and digital assets, Shanghai has clearly defined the direction of industrialization and marketization. The three-year action plan for promoting high-quality development of the manufacturing industry in Shanghai points out that in the implementation of the "four new tracks" and "five future industries" action plans, the development of digital new economies such as blockchain and Web3.0 in pharmaceuticals will promote significant applications of the metaverse. Last August, the Shanghai Data Exchange established the country's first digital asset sector and this year, it collaborated with major domestic blockchain enterprises to strive for cross chain interconnection and interoperability of blockchain. It is reported that in order to achieve on chain asset interconnection and interoperability, Shanghai Data Exchange has formed a "three-step" plan, which will create a trusted hub for blockchain interconnection and interoperability, formulate relevant standards for digital cultural and creative blockchain applications, and activate multi scenario applications of cultural and creative resources.

At the end of last year, the carbon inclusive platform "Shanghai Carbon Bank" settled in digital RMB was launched. Shanghai citizens can calculate carbon emissions reduction based on their travel mileage for subway or cycling trips. The daily low-carbon behavior benefits of users can be exchanged in real-time for digital RMB. To make carbon assets visible, accessible, and measurable, blockchain certificates and smart contracts are used, and code is used to ensure that carbon asset data cannot be changed and no one intervenes.

"The application scenarios of blockchain in Shanghai are particularly rich, with highly developed industries such as finance, shipping, and logistics. Most blockchain businesses can find landing scenarios in Shanghai." Li Ming said that Shanghai has great policy support for blockchain, and its talent advantage is the first in China. "Blockchain requires composite technical talents, integrating multiple specialties such as cryptography, programming languages, and computer networks, and usually requires highly skilled talents. Shanghai happens to be a gathering ground for related talents." He also believes that Shanghai has incubated many blockchain companies, and in commercial operations, there may be "killer" applications in the future. ".